GM Aleksandr Lenderman stood all alone at the top of one of Continental Chess's longest-running tournaments, the 45th annual edition of the Atlantic Open, held this past weekend in Washington, DC.

Among the 43 entrants in the Open Section were 16 Masters, including three GMs and five IMs. Alex, the top-rated player going into the event, lived up to his expectations. He was rewarded for his victory with sole rights to the $2,000 First Prize, along with an additional $100 bonus prize for finishing in Clear First Place, with 4½ points after five rounds. Ryan Goldenberg and Andrew Samuelson also turned in excellent performances, finishing with 4.0, one half point behind Lenderman, but ahead of all the other titled players. They each won $750. Young Christopher Wu captured the $1,200 Top Under 2300 prizes with 3½ points.

One of the top stories of the event was six-year-old Pranav Prem of Virginia, who played one section up in the Under 1500 section. He scored 4½ out of 5
to win the $1,300 First Prize and catapulting his rating nearly 250
points along the way.

In the Under 2100 Section, three players shared the Winners' Circle: Paul Yavari, Vignesh Rajasekaran and Alex Bai. They each scored 4-1 and a $866.67 reward.

Denis Liu followed in Lenderman's footsteps, scoring 4½ to win the Clear First Prize in the Under 1900 Section. Jeyson Flores, Daniel Gong and Vishal Kobla each scored 4 points to receive $433.34.

Tovin Gbenle followed suit in the Under 1700 Section, scoring 4½-½ en route to the $1,500 First Prize. A four-player logjam of Gee Leong, Frank Huber, David Chiodak and Neil Duggal divided up the rest of the prizes to win $325 a piece.

Six-year-old Pranav Prem is certainly one of the youngest players to win Clear First, along with such a large prize, in any CCA class tournament! We should expect to hear a lot more from Pranav in the future!

Bryan Simonaire and Dusty Myers captured the 1st-2nd prizes in the Under 1300 Section.

Fridkin Aronov scored 4½ to win the Under 1000 Section. Five players tied for 2nd-4th with 4-1 (in tiebreak order because plaques were awarded in addition to the money prizes): Nakul Nagappan, Kate Santos Brunottsand Jams Ye finished 2nd, 3rd; and 4th, respectively. Tjyler Forrester was also 1st Under 800; J William Gu was 1st Unrated and Win Persina was 1st Under 600. Both Aronov and Brunotts were limited, as unrated players, to winning $150 in the Under 1000 Section, which resulted in the balance of those unawarded prizes to devolve onto the four other rated players with 4 points, giving them each $225.

Fridkin Aronov also received an additional $800 for the First Place Senior Bonus prize (across all sections). Paul Yavari won an $400 additional 2nd Place Senior Bonus Prize with 4-1 in the Under 2100 Section. Larry Kaufman (Open Section), Terry Coffee (Under 1900), Dennis Burke (Under 1700) and Viktor Ozherelyev (Under 1500) each scored 3.5 in their respective sections. They split the $200 Bonus Prize for 3rd Place Senior equally, winning an additional $50 a piece.